It’s hard to look ahead when we are trying to survive the present. It’s hard to imagine standing outside in the refreshing summer rain when it’s cold and windy outside. It’s hard to think about what the world could – and more importantly should – be like when we eventually emerge from the all-encompassing cocoon that has enveloped the world in 2020. However, if we want to have a say in what that new world will be like, we need to have an idea of what it is that we actually want.

Postalgia is a term coined by the science fiction writer William Gibson (of Neuromancer fame). Postalgia is similar to nostalgia, only while nostalgia is a longing for the distant and disappearing past, postalgia is resignation to the present.

Postalgia sets in when we lose faith in the future and start to believe the here and now is as good as it gets. Postalgia is dangerous in that it is essentially nihilist. If you or your team, employees or customers believe that tomorrow will be no better – or worse – than today, there is no point in planning for the future, and no point in planning or living for anything other than short-term amusement.

As such, societies plagued with postalgia turn to escapism – be that through substance abuse, protests and riots, doomscrolling on social media or virtual reality – rather than focusing on conscious future plans for progress.

Postalgia can affect individuals who lose faith in their own futures, businesses which seek to extract short-term value rather than investing in long-term returns, and nation states that perpetually steal from the future to placate the needs and demands of the present population.

In other words, postalgia sets in when we lose our purpose and no longer see anything worth progressing towards.

In order to break this cycle of the endless treadmill of the infinite now Flux Trends has put together this trend briefing for businesses, teams, entrepreneurs and leaders – to help you overcome the inertia of postalgia in your organisation and your own life as a leader and look to the future with purpose.

To do this Bronwyn Williams from Flux Trends will talk you and your teams through the trends affecting employee and customer mindsets, team cultures, leadership motivation and organisational innovation – for good and for ill.

In the talk you will learn:

• The key emerging, trending opportunities and threats facing entrepreneurs and business leaders in today’s post COVID-19 world, including:
  • The long-run effects of lockdowns and remote work on stressed, depressed and burnt out employees
  • How companies are managing and motivating remote and distributed workforces
  • Societal postalgia and the impact on innovation and productivity at a global and local level
  • The K-shaped economic recovery and the impact on inequality and the social psyche
  • Understanding emerging mass movements, from extinction rebellion to #blacklivesmatter – what these movements mean for the future and the high stakes of ensuring the underlying social unrest is harnessed for productive rather than destructive ends
  • Generation Z and the young gamechangers who are refusing to accept a future with shrinking horizons – and how your organisation can harness that powerful youthful energy by working with rather than against young employees and customers

• How to find your own individual and organisational purpose and leverage trends, insights and information into personal and professional strategy
• How to change behaviours by understanding the mind and cognitive thought control as a means to effect change and overcome any challenge or obstacle
• What is that ‘Secret Sauce’ needed to propel your business and team to achieve all of your goals despite the uncertainty of the future
• Change is inevitable, how we respond is not. Resilience is a key ingredient for success in any field. It is something you can learn and develop. It is an elastic workable human quality. Learn how to bounce forward and not just bounce back.

Looking forward, past 2020, we have two choices ahead of us: we can get stuck in today, in the endless present, caught up in continual daily problems and end up victims of a future that we did not plan, participate in or choose. Or we can look to the future with purpose and arrive there on our own terms, motivated and driven to build the business and nation we want to work and live in.

The choice is ours. Postalgia or purpose? Which do you choose?

Who is this session for? Business leaders, HR professionals, entrepreneurs, marketers, team leaders, managers and anyone looking for inspiration on how to turn current trends into purposeful strategy.

Presented by Bronwyn Williams

– Looking at Trends as Business Strategy-

If you are interested in booking this virtual trend briefing for your team or clients please contact Bethea Clayton on connected@fluxtrends.co.za or +27764539405.

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Image credit: Gallo Images/ Getty Images